The Mac Users Guide to Cool Things You Can Do With Steam

Search game servers

Sometimes, it gets a little boring playing with the same group of friends all the time. So, you can use Steam's dedicated server search to find other minions to dominate. Think of it as also getting some target practice for future gaming sessions with your pals.

Host chat rooms for text or voice chat

If Chatroulette isn’t doing it for ya, then host a voice chat through Steam and get all of your friends ramped up about weekly game night.

Set up a Steam server

Create your own self sponsored servers and host gaming events for you and all of your friends. But be forewarned: this can be a heck of a bandwidth sucker.

Check your gameplay stats

Keep in touch with your inner gamer by checking up on your statistics, how often you play and every Pyro achievement you’ve received in Team Fortress 2. Then, share stats and compare between your teammates.

Play games in "offline" mode

Steam allows you to play games in "offline" mode, so you don't have to deal with crowds. All you get is some good, unadulterated play time in.

Read PDF and web versions of a game manual

If you end up purchasing most of your games as digital downloads, Steam offers download links to web and PDF versions of game manuals. This way, you’ll never have an excuse for not knowing which key engages your weapon.

Play Steams Mods and create your own using developer tools

Mods and Devs tools allow you to basically create a likeness of your least favorite person in the world, port it over to popular game like Left 4 Dead, and then repeatedly pulverize the character.

Get syndicated news on your favorite games

This feature is being specifically heralded in the current UI beta release of Steam for PC users. Game lists enable you to syndicate news about your favorite game titles not just from Steam, but from around the Internet. Each game has a dedicated news channel of its own that you can even view while you’re in game.

Watch Hulu

Steam overlays act a lot like Mac OS X’s Dashboard widgets. In the PC version, you can shift-tab to bring them up while you’re in the middle of a game. With the Hulu overlay, you can watch a few minutes of It’s Always Sunny in Philidelphia as you wait to respawn back into Team Fortress 2.

Listen to Pandora

Game soundtracks and the blast of gunshots aren’t usually on your iTunes playlist, so why should you be held susceptible to them during a rousing game with your friends? Use the Pandora overlay with Steam and crank up some of that Hootie and the Blowfish, instead.

Comments

Glad they have upgraded the client a lot since the last time I was able to use it, hopefully ALL of this will work the same on the Mac as it does on the PC with a much BETTER GUI than the boring one on the PC!